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When North Korea launched long-range missiles this summer, and again on Friday, demonstrating its ability to strike Guam and perhaps the United States mainland, it powered the weapons with a rare, potent rocket fuel that American intelligence agencies believe initially came from China and Russia.
The United States government is scrambling to determine whether those two countries are still providing the ingredients for the highly volatile fuel and, if so, whether North Korea's supply can be interrupted, either through sanctions or sabotage. Among those who study the issue, there is a growing belief that the United States should focus on the fuel, either to halt it, if possible, or to take advantage of its volatile properties to slow the North's program.
But it may well be too late. Intelligence officials believe that the North's program has advanced to the point where it is no longer as reliant on outside suppliers, and that it may itself be making the potent fuel, known as UDMH. Despite a long record of intelligence warnings that the North was acquiring both forceful missile engines and the fuel to power them, there is no evidence that Washington has ever moved with urgency to cut off Pyongyang's access to the rare propellant.
Classified memos from both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations laid out, with what turned out to be prescient clarity, how the North's pursuit of the highly potent fuel would enable it to develop missiles that could strike almost anywhere in the continental United States.
Pop Science earlier has a more detailed look at how their missile might work:
How North Korea's Theoretical ICBM Would Work
Toxic Propellant Hazards ~ 1966 NASA KSC; Hydrazine Rocket Fuel & Nitrogen Tetroxide Oxidizer
It's really nasty stuff...
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @01:56AM (6 children)
Innovation? By Norks?
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @02:15AM (4 children)
WTF are you talking about? UDMH is not an "innovation" -- it was investigated and used as a rocket fuel by both USA and USSR back in the 50s, and is still used today (e.g. Proton-M).
(Score: 4, Interesting) by deadstick on Wednesday September 20 2017, @02:38AM
...and "rare" is an odd adjective to use for something that doesn't exist in nature: there's not much of it because we don't make much. Other forms of hydrazine are used more commonly, like in the F-16 emergency power unit.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday September 20 2017, @08:39AM (2 children)
I was going to make the same comment. It's "the obsolete, toxic, dangerous rocket fuel", it was abandoned decades ago when better alternatives were found. The fact that DPRK has to resort to using this sixty-year-old toxic stuff shows just how bad things are there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @11:23AM
Sure it's toxic and dangerous, but neither obsolete, nor abandoned decades ago. Like I said, it's still used today.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @10:42PM
Nearly all of the little tiny thrusters use it. You'll find it on SpaceX stuff (called the "SuperDraco" I think) and it was used on the Space Shuttle. We use it on planetary probes. We use it for stationkeeping.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @02:41AM
I guess they stopped using Estes C6-7 engines then. I would've went with the Aerotech hybrid N2O/AP myself